


Holding Out For A Hero (I Feel Like Chicken Tonight)

by sunsetmog



Category: BBC Radio 1 RPF, One Direction (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Non-Famous, Getting Together, KFC, M/M, Masturbation, Wooing, swan origami
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-20
Updated: 2017-12-11
Packaged: 2019-02-04 20:47:08
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 11,453
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12779205
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunsetmog/pseuds/sunsetmog
Summary: Nick could say no, he could, but he doesn’t. He likes picking up a drunk and sleepy Louis, who pokes through Nick’s music collection and criticises all of it, or demands that they drive to the late night KFC because he needs chicken and then falls asleep holding a bag of chips two minutes out of the drive through lane. He likes making fun of a drunk Louis Tomlinson, and waking him up when he gets home.He even likes that it’s their secret, that no one else ever knows that this is a thing that happens, a thing that they sometimes do.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Fucking hell. I know, I know, this is the worst title I have ever come up with in all my mumblety mumblety many years in fandom. I'm appalled. I'm using it anyway. 
> 
> Anyway, this stems from this picture:
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> (which is a WhatsApp conversation that goes like this:
> 
> Person A [1:42am]: Hey... can you pcik me up? im to drnuk  
> Person A: [2:01am]: oh u dnt have to anymore.. im home now  
> Person B: [2:19am]: yes..I was aware of that after dropping you off at home.)
> 
> Anyway, the first chapter was originally posted [here on Tumblr](http://magicalrocketships.tumblr.com/post/167662400293/picture-from-this-post-because-i-didnt-want-to), and starts off as not-fic. I'm posting it here now, in this form, so that it all sits together. I should probably apologise for that too.

Nick has been in love with Louis for about eighteen months now, and it’s fucking up all of his attempts to fall in love with anyone else. 

He refuses to acknowledge even to himself that he likes him. Their friends sometimes find their constant bickering amusing, but most of the time they try to keep them apart because there’s a fairly good chance one of them will murder the other. For two years now, Louis has poked and prodded at Nick, and hasn't once ever admitted to Harry, who is his best friend, or Niall who is his flatmate, or Liam who’s his best mate from work, that he even vaguely likes Nick at all. Nick knows, because all their friends used to find it funny that they didn't get on. Now they just find it a pain in the arse. 

So they’ll have Sunday roasts all together, or barbecues round at one of their places, or stupid afternoons in with beers and nachos, and despite all of their best efforts, Nick and Louis will end up arguing over something, bickering over something innocuous, playing devil’s advocate just for the sake of arguing. The others despair of them. They’ve even started having whispered conversations about trying not to invite them to the same place at the same time. 

But, like, sometimes, just sometimes, Nick will see Louis looking a little vulnerable, or quiet, and he’ll do something like make a round of teas so that he can give Louis one without him being suspicious. Or Louis will remember that Nick can’t eat that much cheese so he’ll demand a plate of chili nachos and be super mouthy about it so that it pisses everyone else off, but Nick will get to pick off that plate without making a fuss. 

Then sometimes, for no good reason, even though Louis _knows_ that Nick’s working at their local radio station first thing in the morning, he’ll demand picking up from the pub after last orders, even though Louis could just get a taxi, or call one of his other mates who don't have to be at work by 6am. 

Nick could say no, he could, but he doesn’t. He likes picking up a drunk and sleepy Louis, who pokes through Nick’s music collection and criticises all of it, or demands that they drive to the late night KFC because he needs chicken and then falls asleep holding a bag of chips two minutes out of the drive through lane. He likes making fun of a drunk Louis Tomlinson, and waking him up when he gets home. 

He even likes that it’s their secret, that no one else ever knows that this is a thing that happens, a thing that they sometimes do. 

He doesn’t so much like it when it’s a Saturday night and almost two am and his phone’s on loud and he’s been asleep since half past ten. He goes anyway, because Louis when he’s really drunk can end up anywhere, and it’s good that he does because Louis’s sitting in a doorway near to the taxi rank eating cold chips that may or may not have started off his, and he’s half way to asleep, and Nick has to help him into the car. 

“You have very stupid hair,” Louis tells him, once Nick’s got the engine started again. Nick’s wearing his pyjama top under a hoodie, and he’s pulled on yoga pants - probably Harry’s - and his Vans to come and pick Louis up. He tries to poke Nick in the hair. “Nick. Your hair is very stupid.”

“Is it,” Nick says. 

“I’m hungry,” Louis confides. “I want chips.”

“You just had chips.”

Louis curls up in the seat, under Nick’s spare jacket that was in the back seat. Louis’s in a t-shirt that’s sparkly and a bit sweaty. “Found them,” he says. “Weren’t mine.”

_Oh good_ , Nick thinks. “That’s charming.”

“No point wasting chips.” Louis is very, very drunk. He pokes at his own t-shirt. “This is my speckly t-shirt. Do you like it? I have socks too.”

“I like it,” Nick says. 

“Good,” Louis says. He settles down in his seat. “Wanted you to.”

Christ, Nick is totally fucked. 

At Louis’s house, he has to help Louis out of the car and up to the front door. 

“Where are your keys?”

Louis smiles serenely at him. “Don’t know.”

Nick has to do an impromptu pat down of his pockets. He comes out with a tissue, a Visa card, 31p, and a Yale key. Louis’s holding his phone. He’s been taking pictures of Nick in the car. 

He ends up depositing Louis in his living room, talks himself out of putting Louis to bed, and then goes home with the single aim of burying his face in the pillow and wailing into the abyss. 

Instead, he gets home to a message from Louis that just says _oh u dnt have to anymore.. im home now_ in response to his earlier message demanding a lift. 

Nick wails gently into his duvet cover. He sends Louis a message back pointing out he’s aware Louis’s home, because he took him there. 

Louis sends him another whatsapp, but this time it’s a selfie, taken mostly under the covers. There’s not an accompanying message. 

Nick rolls his eyes. _sleep well and hope the hangover’s not too bad_ , he texts finally. He adds a couple of kisses and then has to go and brush his teeth again just for something to do. 

There’s no message back after that.

The next time, it’s a Friday night, it’s midnight, and Louis is a bit manic. He plays the intro of eleven songs in a row in Nick’s car and refuses to get out when they get back to Louis’s. “Forgot my key,” he says, and keeps a hold of Nick’s phone. 

“Is there a spare?”

“Nope,” Louis says, popping the ‘p’. 

“What do you want me to do?” Nick feels a little bit like banging his head off a wall just to bring himself to his senses. How he feels about Louis fucking Tomlinson is fucking ridiculous. 

“Go back to yours,” Louis says. “Get KFC on the way.”

Nick takes in a long, calming, perfectly normal breath, and does not do anything out of the ordinary like wail into the abyss that he’s in love with a bewildering individual. 

He drives Louis to KFC instead, and Louis demands that they park so that he can go to the toilet, and Nick spends ten minutes in the car park debating whether or not to go in and see whether Louis’s accidentally burnt the place down trying to get chicken. He’s just about decided to go in when Louis comes out, not with a little bag, but with a sharing bucket and all the stuff that comes with it. 

“This, Nicholas, is the six piece wicked variety bucket,” Louis says, plonking himself down in Nick’s front seat and dropping a piece of chicken on the floor. 

“Are you hungry?” Nick asks, for want of something better to do. 

Louis rolls his eyes. “It’s for you,” he says. “I got you Fanta.”

Nick nods. “Right,” he says. “Okay.”

“You should drive now,” Louis says. He waits until Nick has the engine on to hold out a piece of chicken. “I could feed you if you like.”

None of Nick’s fantasies start like this. None of them. He blinks. “Yes please,” he says, because every other word in the English language is apparently missing and presumed dead. 

Louis gently feeds him a chicken mini fillet as Nick goes through the traffic lights on green. 

It’s a very, very weird car journey home. 

It’s even weirder back at Nick’s because Louis is drunk but also bossy, and is determined to set the table for them to eat their midnight chicken feast, and tries to fold pieces of kitchen roll into neat napkins before they’re allowed to eat. 

It’s a catastrophic failure and Nick has to hide the kitchen roll in the cupboard with the teabags and pet Louis gently on the shoulder to make him sit down. 

“I wanted to make you a swan,” Louis says miserably. “Now you won’t kiss me.”

Nick blinks, then again, just for entertainment’s sake. “Um.”

Louis holds out a chicken wing for Nick to eat from his fingers. “Eat,” he says bossily. 

Nick eats. Louis seems remarkably eager to feed Nick all of the food, which is a bad idea because a) it’s midnight b) it’s a bargain bucket designed for four people and c) Nick had had a perfectly serviceable salmon fillet at 6.45 that evening, like other normal people who had their tea at the right time. In the end, Nick has to stack Louis’s plate with bits of chicken and fries and ketchup and bring him a glass of water. 

Maybe the food will soak up the booze. He could do with a drink, though. A large one. He had to have imagined Louis talking about the two of them kissing. 

Had to.

Louis does a credible job of eating about two helpings of chicken, then wipes his face and hands with a failed swan napkin. “Did it work?” he says finally. 

“Did what work?”

“The wooing,” Louis says patiently. 

“Right,” Nick says. “Uh. I mean, like. You’re quite drunk, and everything.”

“A yes or a no, Nicholas. Did it work?”

“Well,” Nick says. “Basically yes, I mean, yes, cos you’re like, you and everything.”

“I’m delightful,” Louis says. 

“You’re a pain,” Nick says. Louis continues to look quite delighted. “I’m going to say yes provided that you remember this in the morning, and ask again.”

“Pfft,” Louis says. “All right. Can I sleep in your bed with you?”

“Yeah,” Nick says, because he’s not really all that sure what he’s supposed to do right now. “All right then.”

He stays behind to clear up the chicken as Louis skids his way down the hall in his socks to the bedroom. By the time he gets to the bedroom five minutes later, Louis’s passed out in the middle of the bed in his pants. 

Nick rolls his eyes, goes to wash his face and hands and brush his teeth, and goes the fuck to bed. 

In the morning, Louis doesn’t wake up until almost eleven. Nick’s in the living room fucking around with his phone and watching the telly. 

“Morning,” Nick says. 

Louis, bleary-eyed and hungover, has the choice of many actions at this point, but Nick is unprepared for the avenue Louis chooses, which is to come and kneel over Nick’s lap and hide his face in Nick’s neck. 

He makes a sad sort of whining noise into Nick’s skin. 

“Right,” Nick says. “Hangover, is it?”

Louis nods, but doesn’t move. 

“You want anything?”

Louis shakes his head. “Did the wooing work?” he asks gruffly, without moving. 

Nick strokes Louis’s back with his hand. “Think so,” Nick says. 

Louis licks Nick’s neck. “Can I stay?”

Nick feels a little at sea. _Get it together_ , he tells himself. “Yeah,” he says quietly, and plays with Louis’s hair. “I’ll even make you a cup of tea if you want.”

Louis rolls off him and deposits himself on the sofa next to Nick. The next thing Nick knows, Louis’s kissed him on the cheek. “I’d like that,” he says. There’s a pause. “And some ibuprofen if you’ve got any.” 

Nick grins, pink-cheeked, and stands up to go and put the kettle on. 

“Is there any chicken left?” Louis calls after him a moment later, a little piteously. 

“I’ll make you a plate,” Nick says, sticking his head back around the kitchen door. Louis is curling up on Nick’s sofa, tugging Nick’s blanket over him and commandeering the TV remote. Nick feels inordinately fond. “It’s nice that you’re here,” he says finally. 

Louis smiles at him. “Had to build up to it,” he says. “The wooing, and everything. Practice a few times, you know, getting you to take me to KFC and everything.”

Nick nods. Behind him, the kettle’s starting to boil. “Ah,” he says. “You had a plan all this time.”

“Course I did,” Louis says, tucking the blanket around him in some satisfaction. “You still got them shit teabags, or have you learned something from me and got the good ones?”

“You’re a monster,” Nick says, but he can’t bring himself to be unhappy about it. He rather thinks there might be kissing later on. He’s really rather looking forward to it. “I’ve got you the good tea, all right?”

Louis beams at him. “Good,” he says. “That’s all right then.”

Nick rolls his eyes. “Monster,” he says again, but despite the hangover, Louis looks really happy, and Nick rather suspects that he does too.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Today I got to tweet: 
> 
>  
> 
> _Do velociraptors have a particularly strong grip, and if they don’t, is there a dinosaur that DOES have a strong grip. Asking for a fic writing friend (me) (I’m asking for me)_
> 
>  
> 
> To which I got three marvellous responses:
> 
> 1) I think the bad claws are on their feet? and they're much smaller than in the movies :\ trying to think of a dino with a good grip...
> 
> 2) Is this about dinosaur handjobs?
> 
> 3) Hmm. Grip strength is muscular, and therefore must be judged from associated musculature, which is judged from muscle attachments on bone. So I suspect that raptors have a lower grip strength in hands rather than feet. *But* I think there are other variables.
> 
> Anyway, I went with velociraptor anyway. Sorry. Sorry again.

It turns out that dating a Louis Tomlinson who drunkenly woos by gently feeding Nick chicken is not all that different to _not_ dating Louis Tomlinson. It's quite bewildering, if Nick's honest. In their first two weeks of secretly kind-of dating, Louis stays over three times but only wanks himself off in Nick's bed a grand total of twice, and really, that's the only difference to how it was before. 

The third time he stays over, he turns up at midnight on a Saturday clutching a pizza box containing only half a pizza, and then passes out on Nick's sofa, still clutching the pizza box. Nick - sleepy and a bit peckish - tries to sneak the pizza box out of Louis's grip, but Louis has the sleep-time grip of an angry velociraptor and will, under no circumstances, give up his pizza, even in sleep. 

It's helpful to note that both wanking incidences happened the morning after the pizza/dinosaur sleep, which was a nice but vaguely bewildering Sunday morning, with Nick being woken up by Louis crawling into bed with him and asking if he could have a wank. Nick reciprocated after the first occasion by coming exactly where Louis told him to, which was mostly over Louis's dick and stomach. It led directly to Louis's second wank, which in turn led to Louis snogging the face off of Nick for exactly thirteen minutes, then having to steal all of Nick's toiletries so that he could shower and go and meet his family for Sunday lunch. 

Previous to that, the first two times Louis had come over by himself, he'd settled himself on Nick's sofa with his feet in Nick's lap. He'd determinedly held his hand whilst refusing to give up the TV remote, and then sneaked off at the end of the evening with only the briefest - seven minutes, at last count - snogging session. 

To be honest, Nick's having to consider the very real possibility that Louis is an alien who's never had to deal with human interaction before, and that everything previous to Chicken Night was a very complicated and well planned hallucination on everyone's part but Louis. 

Nick's just a bit confused by it all, to be honest. 

~*~

Saturday afternoon turns up dragging a hungover bunch of Niall, Harry, Liam, Aimee, Louis and associated hangers-on into Nick's living room. There are eight bags of Doritos and only two little jars of salsa. It's a poor ratio, and made poorer by the fact that Louis's got a face on him like a slapped arse. 

He hides in the corner of the sofa with his knees drawn up to his chest and makes them all watch the Fast and the Furious channel on Sky because he's done something with the Sky remote and no one knows what. 

Nick, who normally deals with a miserable Louis by pretending everyone else wants a tea break, makes two whole rounds of tea and is in the middle of pretending to be desperate for a third when Louis follows him into the kitchen. 

The kettle's boiling, and Nick has no idea what to do with his hands, or his hair, or his gaze, or anything. He's got a secret sort of boyfriend who's wooed him but forgotten to tell him what he's supposed to do next, or even if they're supposed to call each other outside of the odd evening holding hands or early morning wank. 

Louis presses himself to Nick's side, ducking under Nick's arm and hiding his face in Nick's armpit. 

"You all right?" Nick asks, after a moment of awkwardly patting Louis on the head like a strange little dog. 

"No," Louis says. He rubs his nose over Nick's jumper, but doesn't appear out from his hiding place under Nick's arm. The rest of their friends are in the living room. Nick has no idea what to tell any of them about him and Louis, so he's settling for telling them precisely nothing. It's a fair decision, all things considered. 

"Anything I can do?"

"Make me better at my job," Louis says miserably, and Nick feels sort of sad right down to his toes, because Louis is miserable and it's probably contagious. 

Nick awkwardly kisses the top of his head. "Sorry," he says. The kettle's still boiling. "Do you want to stay over tonight?"

Louis stops nosing at his armpit. "Can I?" he asks. He sounds surprised, but not unhappy. In fact, he's perked up. 

Nick swallows. "Course you can," he says. "We can watch YouTube videos of how to make swans out of kitchen roll if you want."

Louis rolls his eyes. "Who'd want to do that?"

Nick shrugs. "Dunno."

Louis goes up on his toes so that he can press a kiss to Nick's temple. Nick's fairly sure his whole giant head is pink from his hair to his jumper. It's awful. 

"We should do that," Louis says. "It'll be cool."

"Yeah," Nick says, which is only one of the things he could say in response to making kitchen roll swans with someone who wooed him with KFC, but unfortunately it's the only thing that comes to mind at the point of crisis. 

"Great," Louis says, and swoops back out of the kitchen and down into the living room. "I've told Nick how to make better tea," he tells the rest of their friends, and Nick rolls his eyes, and makes his secret-maybe-boyfriend tea. 

That night, after everyone's gone and Louis's feigned sleep on Nick's sofa so that Niall went home without him, Louis goes down on Nick in the middle of the living room, Nick's hands tangled in his hair. He pulls off at the end and Nick ends up coming all over Louis's face. 

Louis looks delighted. 

Nick tucks Louis's hand in his and takes him to bed, where he spends a solid three and a half minutes doing a combination of wanking and stroking a finger over Louis's hole before Louis shoots his load all over Nick's chin. 

Louis falls asleep curled into Nick's side, and Nick sweats all night and doesn't for a second consider rolling away. It's really quite a nice way to spend a Saturday night, all things considered.

~*~

The next three weeks sees Louis periodically showing up at Nick's on his way home from work, usually having come via the reduced section in Tesco. Sometimes it's nice, like reduced eclairs that they eat sitting in their pants in the middle of Nick's living room, and sometimes it's strange canapés that have them leaning up against the counter in Nick's kitchen eating twenty tiny pork and apple sauce bites sitting on little snail-like shells of pork scratching bases. Once it was fresh custard and a reduced stir fry mix. They ate them one after the other instead of side by side. Another time it was three cucumbers and a bashed in pack of value lunchbox orange juice cartons, five where there should have been six. 

Sometimes Louis kisses him for the whole of double Corrie, and sometimes he doesn't kiss him but instead insists on putting his hands down Nick's yoga pants (well, Harry's yoga pants, but Nick's not entirely certain he's going to want them back once he figures out what Nick's been doing in them) and tossing him off in front of Bake Off on More 4. One time, Nick lays Louis out on the sofa and sucks him off with the telly on mute behind them, the Arctic Monkeys on Spotify off of Louis's phone singing them through to Louis's orgasm.

Louis's still miserable at work but at least he tends to leave Nick's house looking happier than when he arrived, so Nick counts it as a win. 

The rest of it's too confusing for Nick to make sense of, so he doesn't even try. 

~*~

It's Wednesday night when he gets a message from Louis that just says, _you by yourself?_

Nick lives by himself. He's been thinking about getting a dog, but mostly so far that has limited itself to googling _dog rescue centres near me_ and faffing about going to Pets At Home to see how much dog accessories are. 

_Just me and my imaginary flatmates_ , Nick texts back. He's drinking hot chocolate in his pyjamas because it's important to have a night in sometimes and make yourself the priority. He had been considering a face mask, but frankly he can't be arsed with the hassle and instead he's sitting in front of the telly and contemplating the possibility that he and Louis are just really, really shit at any kind of functioning relationship. 

_Good_ , Louis sends back. _How do you feel about dick pics._

"Well," Nick says, for the sake of his imaginary flatmates. "This is, um."

Louis's sent another text. _Or we could like FaceTime or something if you want to watch me wank._

Oh, fucking hell. 

_Where's Niall?_ Nick texts back, because Niall has very little respect for closed doors, as evidenced by the literal three times Niall's walked in on Nick sitting on the toilet. 

_Chess club_ , Louis texts back. _Reckon he's lying and hes got someone on the go but whatever he's out and not coming back for ages_

"Christ," Nick says, for want of something better to say, and FaceTimes Louis. 

"Hello," Louis says, answering almost straight away. He's naked and sitting up in bed. He's really, really quite delicious. He's all like, really tiny nipples and silly sticky up hair and his hand around his dick. "Fucking awful pjs, love."

"Oi," Nick says mildly. "Love a good PJ, I do."

"It's eight thirty."

"On pyjama night," Nick says. His dick's chubbing up. "You've got to wear pyjamas all night on pyjama night. Them's the rules."

"Suppose," Louis says. "You going to keep them on now?"

Nick already has his top halfway over his head. His pyjama bottoms follow after, and he's walking down the hall to the bedroom with his phone even as Louis's starting to toss himself off. 

Honestly, if it wasn't for the fact that he doesn't have a bloody clue what the fuck's going on, he really would be quite deliriously happy with proceedings. As it is, he comes into his fist four minutes later, and gets to watch a beautifully turned on Louis come all over himself thirty seconds after that. 

Afterwards, he curls up under the covers, and watches Louis do the same. 

"Listened to you on the radio this morning," Louis says. 

"Thought you never listened to me," Nick says, because Louis's always made a very loud point of declaring himself allergic to small town local radio. 

"Chorley FM, coming in your ears," Louis says, in a rotten attempt at a Lancashire accent. 

"Fuck off," Nick says. "See if I wank you off now."

Louis seems to forget all about Peter Kay, and perks up instead. "Will you?" he asks. 

This all seems rather backwards and upside down. He already has tugged Louis off. 

"Course I will," Nick says, puzzled. "However you want it."

"Sitting in between your legs," Louis says. "You could do it like that."

"I could," Nick says. 

"You could pinch my nipples and everything." He's going a bit pink again. Louis does seem to flush up a lot. It's really rather nice. 

"I could," Nick says again. "Whatever you want, really."

Louis looks a little sort of… confused at that. "Yeah?"

"Yeah," Nick says, because this is normal, right? Doing nice things that your sort-of-boyfriend wants. It's normal. He's not the weird one here. 

"Then afterwards, you could come on my face."

"Um," Nick says, because Louis looks enthusiastic and Nick's too old for his dick to be this interested again so soon after the first time. And because he can't stop thinking about the time they'd already done that, and how good Louis looked with Nick's come on his face. "Yeah. We can do that." It's not his fault if he sounds a bit strangled. 

"Great," Louis says, and then he starts listing all of the public playlists that Nick has on Spotify, and all of the rubbish choices Nick's made in creating them. 

To be brutally honest, Nick loves every single fucking second of being the centre of Louis's attention, and he hasn't had a nicer evening in ages. 

~*~

Louis is a fucking brat on Friday night. They're all out in town, and Louis's in his speckle t-shirt, and he's already drunk by the time Nick gets there just after eight thirty. 

"He's had a shit day," Harry says, when Louis snaps at Nick for wearing a stupid t-shirt and then fucks off to the bar. 

"It's fine," Nick says, because Louis is miserable a lot of the time at the moment, and there's clearly shit going down at work that Louis is really refusing to talk about, and because Louis is sharp on the outside like a handful of knives, but inside he's just… different. Sad and vulnerable. He'd shown up at Nick's place last night for an hour of holding hands on the sofa and eating a four pack of reduced chocolate mousses and for at least half an hour of that, he'd looked like he was about to cry. 

"It's not fine," Harry says. "I'm going to tell him. If he can't be nice then he can't come out with us."

"Don't fucking tell him that," Nick says, because whatever is going on with Louis, taking away this will only make it worse. "Promise me you won't."

"Nick—"

"Harry," Nick says, and he's not messing around. "Just leave him for a bit, all right?"

"You've never got on," Liam says. "Thought you wouldn't be the one sticking up for him when he's being a complete arse."

And it might be, like, the objective truth to everyone else, but Nick kind of wants to yell into the abyss that it isn't fucking like that, that of course he and Louis are going to bicker and snap, because they're constantly, constantly desperate for each other's attention, and he hadn't got that before, but he does now. He really, really fucking gets that now. 

"Just leave him, all right?" Nick says. "We all have shit times at work sometimes. It's fine."

Louis doesn't come back from the bar, and after a bit, Nick goes to the loo just for something to do. 

When he comes out, Louis's waiting for him in the corridor. He tugs Nick by the sleeve right round the corner to the back stairs, where no one's standing and no one can see them.

"I'm going to lose my job," Louis says, arms folded. "It's a restructure. My job's one of the restructured ones."

"Louis—"

"I can apply for it, but it'll be different. I'm shit at interviews. I don't know what the fuck I'm doing." He looks miserable as fuck. "How can I stay here when I've got no job? Lease says no jobseekers."

Nick lets out a breath. "You told anyone else?"

"No," Louis says. His bottom lip wobbles. Christ. "Just you. Don't tell anyone."

"You want a hug?" Nick asks. 

Louis nods miserably, and Nick tugs him into a tight hug. "You're not shit," he says, into Louis's ear. "You're anything but shit. You're great."

Louis sniffles. "I'm wearing my speckle t-shirt," he says. "You like this shirt."

"I do," Nick says. He doesn't say that he likes everything Louis wears. He has to keep something in reserve, plus teasing Louis about his stupid clothes is part of the light of Nick's existence. Well, usually. Not tonight. "Look well fit in it, you do."

Louis tucks his face into Nick's neck. "I don't know what I'm doing."

"That makes two of us," Nick says, and they stay there in the shadows, until Louis's stopped sniffling and they can go back out and hit the bar, and Louis can face his friends. 

~*~

Louis shows up drunk the evening after he's had to submit his application to apply for his own job. He's been texting Nick on and off all day, promising to come over and cook Nick his tea, but when he shows up, he's drunk and carrying a tin of beans and a loaf of bread.

"You're drunk," Nick says. 

"Only a little bit," Louis says. He puts the beans and the bread down in Nick's kitchen, and fumbles with the kettle. He puts his finger to his lips. "Got to be," he says. "Got a secret to tell you."

"A nice secret?" Nick asks. 

Louis shakes his head. "No," he says. "Not a nice secret. A stupid secret."

"You got drunk to tell me a secret?"

"Yes," Louis says. He nods. 

Nick tucks Louis into his side. Louis goes easily, curling under Nick's arm and pressing his face into Nick's armpit. 

"You smell nice," Louis says. He looks sad.

"I smell like I haven't showered since last night," Nick says. "Would you like me to make you some tea, drunky?"

"Okay."

Nick makes them tea awkwardly with one hand, the other being rather more busy holding on to Louis, and then the tea sits on the kitchen counter as Louis rubs his nose over Nick's shirt. 

"Don't ever want you to put your dick in me," Louis says softly, without looking up. 

Nick goes still. "Lou—"

"That's my secret," Louis says. "I don't want you to put your dick in me, and I don't want to put my dick in you."

"You got drunk to tell me that?" 

"Yes," Louis says. "In case that was, like, a thing that you wanted more than you wanted me."

"Oh," Nick says. He feels sort of dumb, in both the nothing to say and the stupid sense. He keeps thinking about the times they've been together, the times Louis's come and he's come and that time he touched Louis's arse. 

"Is it something you want more than you want me?" Louis asks. He's still got his face buried in Nick's shirt.

Nick shakes his head. His chest aches a bit because Louis's got drunk just to tell him this, just to be brave. "No," he says. He can't stop thinking about the things they've done together. "Did I ever… did I ever do anything you didn't want me to?"

"No," Louis says. "Only things I wanted us to. Thought you might start wanting the other stuff though. Didn't know how to tell you no."

Nick kisses the top of his head. "Tea's getting cold. I could bring the duvet in and we could have it on the sofa, if you want."

Louis is drunk and a bit sniffly and none of their friends know he's losing his job. He nods into Nick's chest. 

"I think you might be my favourite," Nick tells him softly. "Think I might want you more than I want anything else."

Louis's eyes are wet. "You're the worst," he says, sniffing. "And you have stupid hair."

"That's the spirit," Nick says. "Come on, love. If you're nice to me I'll feed you a packet of biscuits."

"It's not as good as feeding someone KFC."

"No," Nick says, for some understanding of the word _no_. "But then what is?"

~*~

"No one, like, um, hurt you, did they?" Nick asks later, when they've had beans on toast and taken the duvet back through to the bedroom and Louis's sobered up a bit and declared he's staying over. 

"No," Louis says, stripping down to his boxers. "I just don't want it. Nothing in my bum, and I'm not putting anything in yours. I like everything else."

"All right," Nick says. Louis's promised they can talk more about it at the weekend, all the things he's okay with and all the things he's not. He pauses. "Everything else?" He wrinkles his nose. "Feet?"

"No, not feet." Louis makes a face. "You're well weird."

"Latex masks," Nick says, nodding. 

"Fuck off," Louis says. "I don't know why I'm even bothering with you."

Nick hasn't entirely been certain that they have been. He crawls into bed and leaves a space for Louis to tuck himself up next to him. He pulls the covers up once they're settled, and Louis nips at the end of Nick's nose with his teeth. 

He is really, really, delightfully odd. 

"Hey," Nick says softly. "No more getting drunk to tell me stuff, all right?"

"Tried and tested success rate," Louis says. "Got me you in the first place, right?"

"How many times did I have to drive you to KFC in the middle of the night before—"

"Before the wooing," Louis says in satisfaction. "I wooed you well."

"You did," Nick agrees. "Apart from the swans."

"Fuck off with the swans, you try making origami when you're wasted."

"I mean, you properly fucked them up."

"I did not, you were looking at me funny. You put me off my game."

"Your swan game," Nick nods. 

"I could make you a swan napkin anytime you wanted."

"…Now?"

"Not now, dickhead." Louis tucks himself even closer into Nick's side. "It's sleeping time, not swan time."

"I'm going to make you one out of a towel," Nick says. 

"You're not one-upping me on fucking swan origami, Nicholas," Louis says. He pinches Nick's side. "I'm the swan king, not you."

"Right," Nick nods. He waits a beat. "I really like all those times we wanked together, you know."

"Shush," Louis says. "Sleepy time."

"No, it's important," Nick says. "I loved it."

Louis rolls his eyes. "You're making me regret wooing you."

"Yeah, yeah," Nick says, because Louis's gone all pink. "For the record, I don't regret being wooed by you for a second."

"It was the chicken," Louis says softly, sleepily. 

"Yeah," Nick agrees, even though it wasn't the chicken, not even for a second. "Must have been."

"Uh-huh," Louis says, but he's already mostly asleep. 

"Uh-huh," Nick says, and closes his eyes.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which there is a swan called Kevin, quite a lot of feelings, and Niall takes a toothbrush to chess club.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Everything about this whole premise is ridiculous. I've loved writing this. Thanks to **pillarboxred** for 'swamingo'.

The night before Louis's interview to reapply for his own job, Nick turns up on his doorstep bearing gifts. 

He hadn't, unfortunately, bargained on Niall opening the door. 

"Oh," Nick says, trying to immediately disappear two Sainsbury's carrier bags into thin air. He never had been any good at sleight of hand. The carrier bags remained exactly where they had been three seconds previously. "Hello."

"All right, mate," Niall says. He's holding a toothbrush and is half in and out of his jacket. "Did I know you were coming round?"

"Nope," Nick says, because Louis's text had said _any time after half seven, niall's off out for a shag_. He'd left it until a quarter to eight, content in the knowledge that Niall was usually on time, and Louis always left contingency time because he was pathologically late. "Just, um, you know. Popped by. Had something for Louis. Said I'd drop in."

Niall nods, like Nick popping by with something for Louis is entirely normal and this isn't the first time in the history of forever this has ever happened. Nick's hoping he looks as casual as Niall does, but then Niall's not weighed down by two carrier bags and a secret relationship. He is carrying a toothbrush, though. It's probably so-so.

"I mean, fair play to you," Niall says, battling with his jacket. His toothbrush gets caught in his sleeve. "I don't know what's wrong with him. He's been hiding in his room the last couple of nights. Proper bad mood. Hasn't even wanted to play Fifa."

"Right," Nick says. "Are you going out?"

"Yeah," Niall says. "Chess club. See if you can avoid having a full-on row, will you? I know you and Louis, like, only communicate by bickering, but something's going on with him and I think he could do without being snapped at, you know?" He zips his jacket up. "Just be nice, all right? He won't talk to me. Not talking to anyone, I think. Bit worried, if I'm honest. Think me and Leemo are going to corner him on Saturday."

"All right," Nick says. "I'll be nice."

Niall slips his toothbrush into his pocket. He's definitely doing something that's a bit more adventurous than chess club if he's taking a toothbrush, Louis was right. He pats Nick on the arm. "Good-oh," he says, then calls over his shoulder, "Tommo, Nick's at the door." He grins at Nick. "See you later. Friday night, maybe?"

"Probably," Nick says, and he takes his carrier bags inside and closes the door behind him. He puts them down in the hall and toes off his trainers, padding down the hall towards Louis's bedroom. 

The door's shut, and Nick knocks before pushing it open. Louis had only sent him a text fifteen minutes ago telling him to hurry up, so he's not worried about not being wanted. 

Inside, Louis's sitting on the bed with his knees drawn up to his chest and his hoodie pulled up over his head. 

"Hiya," Nick says. "Sorry about getting here before Niall left."

Louis gives him a look. "Doesn't matter," he says. He's got a closed book in his lap, _How to succeed in interviews and get the job you deserve_. He tosses it on the floor and beckons Nick closer. "You're here now."

Nick is, in fact, here now. He doesn't really know what to do with himself so sits down on the bed and lets Louis arrange his legs over Nick's thighs and lean in to rub his nose over Nick's cold cheek. 

"How's things?"

"Shit," Louis says. "I'm never going to get this job tomorrow."

Nick strokes Louis's thigh. "Course you will, love. You'll walk it."

"Don't say that," Louis says. He pushes his hood down. "I don't want to disappoint you." He looks genuinely upset. 

"You couldn't. You executed a really good wooing plan," Nick says, after a moment. "Planned it all and everything. Not everyone could do that, you know. Win me. Took brains, that did."

"Huh," Louis says. "I did. Forgot that. Won you." He looks marginally happier. "Least I got something right."

"I am all won," Nick says. He tucks a bit of hair behind Louis's ear and leans in to kiss him. He's not always certain what kind of kiss Louis wants - some nights are definitely more of the hand-holding variety, and Nick will go with that if that's what Louis wants - so he just presses his mouth to Louis's, then sits back. "Brought you your tea. It's in a bag in the hall."

Louis shuffles over a bit so he can tuck himself into Nick's side. "Thanks," he says. He hides his face in Nick's shoulder. "Scared about tomorrow," he admits softly. "I'm shit at interviews."

"No one in the history of the world has ever gone into an interview and not been scared," Nick says. Louis is running his thumb nail along the seam of Nick's jeans. "You've got to go in and think, _I know I can do this job_. And you can do it. I know you can. You're already doing it."

"I am already doing it." Louis says. He tucks himself a bit tighter in along Nick's side, appearing marginally mollified. "What's for tea?"

"Well, fish is good brain food," Nick says, ignoring Louis's nose wrinkle. "So I've got some breaded fish, and if you don't want that, chicken kievs because apparently me and you have a history of chicken being successful, and some peas and oven chips and some salad because greens are good for you. Got you some orange juice, cos you like that, and some decaf tea - don't look at me like that, you're getting a good night's sleep tonight - and there's Victoria sponge for pudding." He clears his throat, because Louis's sat back and is just looking at him. "Got you some, uh, cereal and stuff for breakfast tomorrow too."

"You were a good person to win," Louis says, lacing his fingers through Nick's. "Worthy of my chicken."

Nick nods. "Chicken-worthy," he says solemnly. 

Louis smiles, and Nick thinks, _maybe this is going to be okay_. 

~*~

Louis's interview doesn't go brilliantly. He comes over after work and plonks himself down in Nick's lap. He's wearing a shirt and tie under his zip-up hoodie. 

"You look very smart," Nick says, sliding his hands along Louis's thighs and cupping his arse. 

"I scrub up well," Louis agrees. They're not talking about the interview. Nick's already promised him in a text that they can leave it until tomorrow, and anyway, Louis's been told he won't hear for a few days. He shuffles forward a bit so he can rock his hips up. Nick can already see the outline of his dick in his trousers. 

"It's a hot look," Nick says. 

"Hot enough that you'll wank me off?" 

Nick pretends to consider it. "Hmmm," he says. 

"You can come on my face after."

"Only if you want me to."

Louis rolls his eyes. "Course I want you to," he says. "I always want you to." _Always_ , Nick knows, is a relative term. He's more than happy to let Louis define the boundaries. 

Louis is already shrugging off his hoodie and undoing the top button of his trousers. 

Nick bats his hand away. "Greedy," he says, and unzips Louis's flies so that he can release Louis's dick into the wild. 

He chooses, relatively gracefully, not to say that out loud. 

Louis lets out a breath. "Take your top off," he says. "Want to come on you."

"Course you do," Nick says, and tugs off his jumper. He's naked underneath it, mostly because he's been waiting for Louis to turn up for an hour now, and Louis's texts have done more than suggest that this was their plan for the evening. 

Louis runs his hands down Nick's chest, stopping to pinch at his nipples, then curving down over his stomach. He's investigative in a way that no one's really bothered with before, a little furrow in his brow as he takes it all in. He sits back and starts to loosen his tie. 

Nick stops him. "Leave it," he says. "I mean. If you don't mind. You look hot."

Louis rolls his eyes. "Shirt and tie with my dick out," he says, but he looks happy about it. He leans forward and kisses Nick. "You can have whatever you want."

"You're hot, dressed all smart and shit," Nick says, running his hands up and down Louis's shirt sleeves.

Louis beams. "I am," he says. He wraps his hand around his dick. "Think I can come on your nipples?"

"You're so weird," Nick says. "Course you can."

"Good," Louis says, and starts to wank. 

Nick doesn't know what to do with his hands, so he ends up cupping Louis's face and pulling him in for a kiss. Louis goes easily, letting Nick lick into his mouth. He tastes minty. It's more Wrigleys than Colgate, but Nick appreciates the effort nevertheless. He likes a bit of mint, he does. Likes a bit of Louis more, though. 

In the end, it's Louis who pushes him away so that Nick's back's pressed up against the sofa back, one hand to Nick's shoulder to keep him there. 

"What?" Nick asks, because Louis is a bit breathless as he tugs himself off, but he's concentrating kind of fiercely. 

Louis makes a face. "Just want to come on you."

"You can," Nick says. "Whenever you want."

"Shush," Louis says, "I'm busy."

Nick grins, catching his bottom lip between his teeth, and tries not to get embarrassed by the fierce, focused look on Louis's face. His dick's already tenting out his pants, a little damp spot at the tip where he's leaked. He doesn't touch, content to let Louis lead things. He's the one who's had a shit day, and Nick likes Louis when he's happy and in control. 

He likes it even better when Louis comes on him, all over his chest. He's pink cheeked and delighted, and it just turns Nick on more. He lets Louis take a hold of his dick and tug him off, telling him all the time how good Nick looks with Louis's come all over him, and it's not long before Nick's coming too, all over Louis's fist. 

"There," Louis says in satisfaction. 

Nick, breathless and pink and desperately in need of a shower, curls his fingers in Louis's hair and nudges him closer for a kiss. "There," he echoes, and wonders why he never realised this was what he needed before today. 

~*~

On Friday, he gets a text from Harry to say that everyone's going out for drinks and Nick should come and join them. 

_Louis's coming too_ , his follow up message says. _Niall says he's a mess. No idea what's going on with him, he won't tell us anything_. 

Nick's heart sinks. The last he'd heard was before work that morning, when Louis had sent him a couple of messages detailing how Louis had spent the half hour in bed before his alarm had gone off, complete with pictures. 

Nick, scanning through them in the toilets at work during a three song interval when he was supposed to be going over the production plan with his producers, had praised himself for not giving in and going for a quick wank before going back to work.

 _I'll be there_ , he texts back, then opens a new message to Louis. Nothing since this morning. 

_You going for a drink tonight?? Harry just asked me._

He doesn't get a reply. 

The pub is one of their usual ones, on the outskirts of the town centre so that they can go on somewhere else if they want, or get home without too much hassle if they don't. It's busy because it's a Friday and only the fact that Liam's been here since work means they've got a table of any kind of size at all. Everyone's already there when Nick arrives, Niall and Louis and Harry and Liam, Liam's girlfriend and a couple of Niall's mates from work. There's someone new too, a bloke from Liam's new work, and Louis looks mutinous. Louis had always seemed to be okay with the fact that Liam had moved jobs - they'd met at work, and been partners in crime as far as Nick had always understood - but he's clearly not dealing tonight. 

Louis isn't looking at him. This doesn't bode well. 

"All right, lads and lasses," Nick says. "Anyone want anything from the bar?"

Louis's got half a pint left. "Another one of these," he says, without looking up. He fumbles in his pocket for his wallet. 

"Don't worry," Nick says. "Buy me one later. Anyone else?" Louis looks relieved for a second, but then he goes back to saying how shit Derby County is. Everyone else is sorted for drinks, so Nick goes to the bar for him and Louis. 

After a minute, Harry follows him, slipping in through the rush at the bar to find a space at Nick's side. "Louis's being a dick," he says. 

Nick's heart aches, and for the hundredth time he wishes Louis felt like he could share what's going on at work with his mates. "Don't worry about it."

Harry raises an eyebrow. "Thought you be going off on one."

Nick shrugs. "You want anything?"

Harry shakes his head. "Just thought I'd come and say hi."

Nick rolls his eyes, and orders a couple of drinks. 

It's later when he decides he needs to do something. Louis's down the other end of the table, argumentative and snappy. If they were at home, Nick would make a round of tea, but it's not really an option here. Instead, he pats his jacket pockets. "I'm off out for a cig," he says, even though he's not got a packet with him and he's trying to limit his habit to a box a month. "Anyone coming?"

Liam would probably come too, but his girlfriend's giving him a pointed look, which Nick was banking on. Her name's Rhoda, and she's been around a few weeks, but Nick's not certain she's going to be staying around. Liam's last girlfriend had been with him for ages, and he was a broken mess when they broke up. They all suspect that he's not quite over Sophia yet, and Rhoda seems fairly casual too. It's nice to see him smiling again, though. 

"I'll come," Louis says, "but I'm going for a slash first."

"Fair enough," Nick says, and doesn't leave any time for anyone else to say yes. 

Outside, he waits just outside the smoking area, hands shoved in his pockets against the cold. It's another few minutes before Louis shows up, barrelling into him and pressing him into a hug. 

"They gave my job to someone else," Louis says, mouth pressed to NIck's throat, and Nick's chest contracts. 

"Lou—"

"Don't," Louis says, still pressed tight into a hug. "I can't cry about this tonight."

Nick tangles his fingers into the short hair at the nape of Louis's neck. "What happens now?"

"Dunno," Louis says. He licks Nick's throat. "They haven't even told me I haven't got it yet. You know we've got mixed bogs at work now? I was hiding in there for a bit and this lass came in and didn't realise I was in there. She was calling her boyfriend about her new job. It was supposed to be confidential. It was my job title. She got my job."

"Oh, love," Nick says. What a shit, shit way to find out. "You should have rung me."

"And said what? Your boyfriend's a loser? Shit phone call."

 _Boyfriend_. "You're not a loser," Nick says softly. "You're never a loser to me."

Louis just hugs him harder. "Knew I picked a good one."

"You did," Nick says, rubbing his back. "Do you want to get out of here? Get something to eat?"

"Chips might be nice."

"I was thinking KFC," Nick says, as neutrally as he can manage. 

Louis pulls away. "You trying to woo me?"

"Nah," Nick says. "Already got a wicked boyfriend, haven't I?" _Boyfriend_. "Just fancied chicken, that's all."

Louis grins. It only looks a bit weak. "You're wooing me."

"Maybe a little bit."

Louis looks happier. "Are we getting a bucket?"

"If you want one," Nick says, which is a funny way of saying _whatever you want, whenever you want it_ , but he'll go with it. 

~*~

It's easy enough for them both to make their staggered excuses and meet up round the corner from the pub twenty minutes later. Louis's waiting for him, sitting up on top of the wall by the Chinese takeaway, and he jumps down as Nick arrives, tucking himself into Nick's side and making Nick put his arm around him. 

"You all right?" Nick asks. 

"Nope," Louis says, "but I'm not thinking about it until tomorrow. Or Monday, I don't know. Whenever they tell me I'm not even good enough to do my own job."

Nick leans in and kisses Louis's temple. "I think you're brilliant."

"It's the swan origami," Louis says sagely, but he looks marginally happier than he has done all evening, so Nick thinks maybe it'll be okay. 

~*~

_Niall's got an emergency meeting of his chess club tonight so you should come over_

Louis's message arrives half way through Saturday afternoon, when Nick was flicking through the jobs page that came with the free paper that got pushed through his letterbox every Friday. He's not really certain what Louis wants to do for work, or even if he'd like Nick looking for him, but it doesn't hurt to have a look. It might even be a bit presumptive, because it's not like Louis's been told he's out of a job, and he might have been mistaken about what he'd overheard. 

_Cool what time?? And what kind of chess club has emergency meetings?_

_The shagging kind_ , Louis texts back. _8ish probably. I'll text when he's gone._

_Looking forward to it. You want me to pick up a takeaway?_

_Nah_ , Louis texts. _Niall's doing us dinner before chess. Think he's gonna give me the stop being a dick talk._

Nick sighs. _You gonna tell him whats going on?_

 _Dunno what to say. Probably going to wait until I've properly lost me job._

It's difficult to know what to say, and what Louis's going to find helpful. He settles for _chin up_. 

Louis sends him back a picture of himself with his chin tilted well up. Nick can practically see up his nose. He suspects he deserved that. 

~*~

Niall's definitely gone this time when Nick arrives, because Louis answers the door in boxers and a t-shirt, and tugs Nick inside with a kiss. 

"You should stay over," Louis says, helping Nick off with his coat and his bobble hat and already starting to tug at the bottom of Nick's jumper. "And I've been thinking that you should come on my face."

Nick stumbles trying to toe off his Chelsea boots. "Okay," he says, for want of something better to say. 

"Good," Louis says, in satisfaction. "I went to the shops for snacks so we don't have to leave the bedroom all night."

Nick kicks his shoes to one side, and wraps an arm around Louis's waist, tilting his chin up for another kiss. "What are we waiting for, then?"

"Dunno," Louis makes a big deal of cupping Nick's face in his hands. "Hello."

"Hello," Nick says. 

"You should come on my face," Louis says again. "Then afterwards you should tell me how good I am."

Nick definitely feels considerably more turned on than he had done two seconds ago. "Oh yeah?"

"Yeah," Louis says. He looks considering. "Think I'd like being good for you."

"You been thinking about it?"

"Only a bit." He makes a face. "You can tell me how good I am during, if you like."

"If I like."

"If you like," Louis agrees. "You're wearing too many clothes."

"So are you."

Louis pulls his t-shirt over his head. He laces his fingers with Nick's and tugs him down the hall to his bedroom. 

Nick's heart's pounding. "You're lovely," he says, without thinking, and Louis tosses him a smile over his shoulder. It's blinding. 

"You are, you mean," he says, and once they're inside his bedroom, he pushes Nick up against the door and kisses him. 

Nick laughs against his mouth and kisses him back. 

It turns out that not only does Louis really like being told how good he is, Nick really likes being the one doing the telling. It's lovely, seeing Louis get all pink and obedient and proud, and honestly, Nick would pay actual money to get Louis to wear that proud look more often. He'll call him good over and over and over if that's the fall-out. 

After he's come, when Nick's wiped Louis's face down with a baby wipe — new packet, Nick notes, with a little interest — Louis tucks himself into Nick's side and pokes at Nick's dick. 

"Is your dick all right with not being able to do normal dick stuff with me?"

"My dick's all right with whatever I tell it to do."

"Ah," Louis nods. "So you have conversations with your dick, then. Knew you were weird."

"Shut up," Nick says. "Anyway, far as I'm concerned, wanking's what dicks are for, anyway."

"I think so," Louis says. He sounds a little quieter. His fingers catch in Nick's pubes. "You sure it's not, like, something you're going to hold against me later?"

"Positive," Nick says as neutrally as he can manage. There have been a couple of lads around Louis in the couple of years they've known each other, but they've never stuck around more than a few weeks. Nick considers searching them out and giving them a good talking to if they're in any way responsible for the hesitance Louis's currently displaying. He'd suggest punching them, but Nick's always been shit at anything physical. "Like you, don't I? Just how you are."

Louis leans in to bite at Nick's nipple. It's hopefully some kind of declaration of appreciation, but Nick's never been that sure when it comes to Louis. 

"Will you help me try and find a new job if I have to?" Louis asks, after a minute. "And not laugh because I'm fucking unemployable."

Nick wraps his arm around Louis's shoulder. "I think you're brilliant," he says, because it's the truth. "And fuck anyone who thinks different, cos they're wrong."

"Fuck 'em," Louis agrees. "But not me. Don't fuck me."

Nick presses a kiss to Louis's temple. "Never," he says softly, and Louis tucks himself closer into Nick's side with a packet of bacon Frazzles and Netflix on his laptop. 

"Good," Louis says, and lets Nick pick the first film. 

~*~

In the morning, Nick stumbles into the shower with Louis's towel and then afterwards, out again, straight into Niall. 

"Um," Nick says, holding Louis's towel closed and hoping it's draped well enough that his dick isn't a part of this conversation too. He'd been kind of lazy, based on the assumption it was just him and Louis in the flat.

"Um," Niall says. 

"I didn't know you were in," Nick says, which potentially may not have been the greatest opening. 

"I wasn't," Niall says. He looks Nick up and down. "What are you doing here?"

"Needed a shower, didn't I?" Nick says, trying not to glance at Louis's closed bedroom door. "Louis said I could."

"Yours broken, or summat?"

"Summat," Nick agrees, nodding. "Erm, I'll just, um. Put some clothes on."

"Cool," Niall says, nodding. "I'll stick the kettle on."

"Yeah," Nick says, and he's nodding back like a stupid puppet on a string. He stumbles into Louis's bedroom to find Louis shaking with laughter on the other side of the door. 

"Oh my god," Nick says, whipping off his towel and smacking Louis in the thigh. "Why didn't you tell me Niall was home?"

"Didn't know he was," Louis says, stealing the towel off of Nick and holding it out of reach. "Funny, though, right?"

"Hilarious," Nick says, and just for that, steals a pair of Louis's pants. 

~*~

Nick's braced for a text from Louis on Monday, but his phone rings at half past eleven instead. 

"Lou?"

"I didn't get the job," Louis says. "My job. I didn't get my job."

"Louis, I'm so sorry." His heart sinks. His brilliant, ridiculous, KFC wooing boy. 

"Doesn't matter," Louis says. He sounds tired. "They offered me another one instead. They to try and, like, reallocate you or something, I don't know. Saves them on redundancy payouts, right?"

"They offered you another job?"

"Yeah. Different team, like. I don't know. It's a job, right? I mean. Don't know much about it yet, but I didn't get my job, like, the actual job I'm doing because apparently there's someone better at it than me who hasn't done it yet, but whatever."

"Do you want to come round tonight?" Nick asks. 

Louis lets out a breath. "I don't want to have sex," he says. "Any kind of sex. Not tonight."

"All right," Nick says, and doesn't point out he hadn't offered any. "We can just eat pot noodles in our pants if you want."

"You have all the best ideas," Louis says. He sounds marginally brighter. The pot noodle thing was a joke, but if it's what Louis wants, Nick'll do it. "Can we have supernoodles instead?"

"Whatever you fancy," Nick says. "You want me to pick some up?"

"Nah," Louis says. "I'll go to the shop. Which flavour supernoodle?"

Nick hasn't eaten supernoodles since university. "Don't mind. You pick."

"I like picking," Louis says. There's a pause. "Thanks. For, like, helping with all of this. Not calling me a loser cos I can't keep my own job."

"Life's just a bit shit sometimes. I'm sorry."

"You're not shit," Louis says. "Couldn't have done this without you."

Nick feels a little bit emotional. He tries to ignore it. "You would have told one of the others."

"Nah, would have just been well miserable and scared by myself. Got you though, haven't I?"

"Available as required for misery support," Nick says. He pauses. "You all right?"

"Ehhh," Louis says, which could mean anything. "I'll come round for my tea, all right? I'll be over after Tesco."

"Looking forward to it," Nick says, but Louis's already rung off. 

~*~

Tea is curry supernoodles and a Gregg's sausage roll each, followed by a packet of four jam doughnuts to share. Nick makes soft, vague noises about the gym, but Louis waves him off with a _pffft_. 

"Not every day we get to celebrate," he says. He looks a bit pink. "Jeff told me that he likes that I can be mouthy in meetings. He said he needed a fighter in his team."

"That your new boss?" Nick asks. 

"Yeah," Louis says. "Said it was why he picked me. No one likes that about me. My teacher at school said I wouldn't ever amount to anything. He was so fucking boring though, sometimes I felt like throwing myself out the window."

Nick wraps an arm around Louis's shoulder. "He was a dick," he says. "A proper shit teacher. Not worth thinking about. He was talking shit."

"I was a pain," Louis says. He feeds Nick a mouthful of sausage roll for no good reason at all. Nick accepts it with grace, and a healthy scattering of crumbs on his sofa.

"So," Nick says, once he's swallowed his bite of sausage roll. "Tell me more about how amazing this Jeff fellow thinks my boyfriend is."

Louis grins, and tangles his fingers with Nick. "Maybe it's not going to be shit after all," he says, and Nick lets out a breath. 

~*~

Nick hosts Saturday night at his the following week, in part due to Louis calling him up and telling him that he and Niall were coming over, and in part because it's pissing it down and this way he doesn't have to leave the house. 

Harry shows up after a bit bearing a soaking umbrella, a homemade salad, and a bottle of something called Becherovka that someone at his work had turned up with and asked if anyone wanted. "Her mother-in-law brought it back from holiday for her," Harry says, handing it over, "so she thinks it's probably poisoned."

"And you brought it here," Nick says, turning the bottle over in his hand. 

"We're not as discerning as Margaret," Harry says. "Can I put my umbrella in your bath to dry?"

"Course," Nick says, wandering down towards the living room. "Harry's brought us a salad and something impenetrably foreign and alcoholic."

Niall pops his head up. "I've had that," he says. "When me and the lads went to Prague."

"How'd you drink it?" Nick asks.

"Can't remember. I'll look it up." 

"Not yet you won't," Louis says. They've brought their old Wii over and are subjecting Nick to some kind of Mario Kart championship. Liam's looking faintly miserable so Nick suspects Louis's just beaten him. "It's your turn for me to smash you."

It's nice, seeing Louis happy again. Nick grins, and Louis shoots him a wink as Liam and Niall swap places. 

"All right, lads?" Harry's followed Nick in, this time without his umbrella. "Nice day for it."

Nick rolls his eyes. Niall's got his Mario wheel all ready to go, but Louis's holding everything up. 

"I lost my job," he says suddenly. "That's why I was a right mardy arse. I was losing my job. They were making me redundant."

"Lou—" Niall says. 

Louis shakes his head. "Got a new one though. Nick helped me. So it's all all right. This new one, they actually want me cos I'm mouthy."

The past few weeks summed up in a few lines. Nick leans against the door frame. The lads are all talking, Niall with his arm wrapped around Louis's shoulders, a mess of _congratulations_ and _why the fuck didn't you tell us, we would have helped_. Louis just shrugs at that, but he's beaming. 

It's doing queer, queer things to Nick's insides, that smile. Quite hopelessly lovely things. 

Nick lets Louis's friends dog pile him, and goes to put the kettle on. 

He comes back a few minutes later with a cup of tea. 

"Who's that for?" Harry asks. 

"Louis, of course," Nick says, rolling his eyes. He puts it down on the coffee table by Louis's socked feet. As a statement, it's a relatively quiet one.

Louis's gone pink. 

"Are you making one for the rest of us?" Harry asks. 

"Suppose I could do," he says, and consoles himself with the fairly solid knowledge that if he's making tea for everyone then he's not embarrassing himself losing Mario Kart to an ecstatically competitive Louis. "Everyone else in for one?"

There's a chorus of _yes_ from Harry, Niall, and Liam, and he heads back to the kitchen to stick the kettle back on. 

"Love you, Nick," Louis calls after him. 

Nick goes still. He sticks his head back out the kitchen door. Louis's pink-cheeked. The other lads haven't seemed to realise that the world's just tilted on its axis and Nick's life has changed forever. They're fighting over whether Harry can go next instead of Niall on Mario Kart.

Louis's holding Nick's cup of tea. He winks at Nick, and something desperately hopeful settles in Nick's chest. 

Nick nods, for want of something better to do, and Louis buries his smile in his tea. 

~*~

"What the fucking fuck is that?" Niall asks. It's half eleven and they're three quarters of the way down the bottle of Becherovka. It does not taste good with orange juice in Nick's opinion, but it's better with tonic. Harry likes it in a shot glass. Nick's not sure that Louis likes it at all, but he's drunk it anyway. Thank fuck the bottle's almost done.

"It's a swan," Nick says. He's made it out of a towel using a Wiki-how tutorial in his bathroom. It's a bit lopsided, and the towel's the one he accidentally dyed pink when he ruined his lovely red knitted jumper by shoving it in the washing machine. The swan's sort of flamingo-like. A swamingo. He's named it Kevin. 

He's standing in the doorway to his living room holding a very poor attempt at a flamingo towel, and his heart's pounding. 

Louis sits up. He's been lying with his feet in Niall's lap and his face smushed up against Liam's thigh for the best part of an hour. "Did you make me a swan?"

"Absolutely fucking did," Nick says. His hands might be shaking. He's not sure. He's quite drunk. Margaret from Harry's work might be right, and the bottle of Becherovka might be poisoned and he might be dying. Either that or he's making some kind of very weird sort of attempt to capture Louis's heart in front of their friends. It could go either way. 

"You trying to woo me?" Louis asks. 

"A bit," Nick says. "Is it working?"

"Holy shit," Harry says, which isn't too far from Nick's internal monologue, so he'll let it slide. He rather suspects it's the verbal equivalent to the expression on Liam's face too. Niall's harder to read, but he takes his toothbrush to chess club, so clearly can't be trusted to express his emotions in a way that a vaguely drunk Nick can parse whilst keeping one eye on Louis. He'll figure it out later. 

Kevin the swamingo wobbles. 

"Bring it here then," Louis says, shoving Niall over so that there's space for Nick on the sofa. "I want to rate it out of ten."

Nick obediently squishes himself onto the sofa in between Louis and Niall, and deposits the lopsided gift into Louis's lap. 

"Be careful with Kevin, he's delicate," he says, because there's no way his flamingo-swan is going to be up to rigorous judging. 

Louis tucks his hand into Nick's. "Fucking swan origami," he says. He's beaming.

"Yeah," Nick says, and smiles.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Tumblr](http://magicalrocketships.tumblr.com/tagged/holding-out-for-a-hero-%28i-feel-like-chicken-tonight%29).
> 
> In other news, I was the one at work who took home the bottle of Becherovka courtesy of someone's family member, but as of yet I haven't tried it and can't report back.


End file.
